Google's Adsense is one of the most powerful weapons in website publisher's arsenal. It enables you to monetize your sites easily and if used properly can generate a very healthy income. However, if you're not using it properly and maximizing the income you squeeze from it, your leaving money on the table ? something we all hate doing.
Boosting your return from Adsense can be done very easily and quickly, and you'll be amazed by the results.
I ran Adsense on my sites for over a year before I discovered these techniques, and like many people, I though I was doing pretty well. My clickthrough rates and CPM figures were very healthy, and I didn't honestly think that they could be improved a great deal. How wrong I was. Immediately after I implemented a few quick changes my clickthrough rate more than doubled, and by doing some fine tuning I manged to get nearly three times as many people to click on the ads as had been previously doing so.
The first technique is one that was 'discovered' by the amazingly helpful Debs, on SiteSell's SBI! forums. When I read it originally, it made sense and I decided to goive it a go, but I wasn't prepared for the immediate impact it would have on my income. It involves making only a few simple changes to the format and positioning of your Adsense ads.
Firstly, forget about using banners or skyscrapers. These ad formats are almost universally ignored by surfers. Why? Because we've all been conditioned to recognise a skyscraper or banner as an advert and as these adverts are rarely of any interest, we ignore them. What's needed is a way of integrating Adsense ads into the editorial on your site as seamlessly as possible. To do this you need to do three things:
1. Use the 250 x 250 rectangle format 2. Make the background color of the ad the same as the background color of your site, or as close to it as possible. 3. Make the ads borderless by setting the border color to be the same as the background color of the ad.
These changes can be made by logging into your Adsense account and creating a custom format. Just select the 250 x 250 ad format, and create a custom color palette. Use the color picker to pick the coor you want. The Javascript is automatically generated at the foot of the page, ready for you to copy and paste into the pages on your site.
Now, you need to position your ads where surfers are most likely to click on them. Research using retina scanning technology has shown that the place that surfers tend to look at first and most often is the top left. I don't know the reasons for this, perhaps it's because that's where we're used to seeing the most useful search engine results (at the top of the rankings) and search engines are the sites we most often visit, so we automatically look at the same place on other sites.
Whatever the reasoning, as soon as I made the above changes to my Adsense ads, clickthrough rates doubled, immediately.
The second technique is much newer and one which is entirely based on my own experience. Google has recently added a new type of Adsense format, called Adlinks. This displays a series of links on your page in the same style of Ad unit as regular Adsense ads. When a user clicks a link they are taken to a page of adverts that resembles regular Google search results. As a publisher, you are paid every time a user clicks one of those ads.
Adventurous soul that I am, I jumped in with both feet and started to trial Adlinks on my most visited pages as soon as it was launched. I'm using the four links in a square box format, positioned top left of my page content. After a few weeks of running Adlinks alongside regular Adsense ads, it's clear that the return on Adlinks is about a fifth to a quarter higher than regular ads. There's no clear reason for this but one explanation may lie in the fact that clicking on an Adlink takes the user to page of 'results'. When a user clicks on one of these, you are paid for the click. If the user finds what they want, great, if not, it seems that they hit the Back button on their browser and try again, just as you would for normal search engine results. Then they click on another result, and you get paid again. So it's possible to be paid more than once from the same Adlink click. Now, this reasoning is speculative, but it does make perfect sense in the light of my Adlinks results.
Finally, Adsense has some excellent tracking statistics that allow you to track your results across a number of sites on a site by site, page by page, or just about any other basis you choose. This is a very powerful tool and you should use it to find out which ads are performing best for you and fine tune your Adsense and Adlink ads accordingly.
So you see, by spending an hour or so of your time making a few adjustments to the Adsense ads on your sites, you can very quickly treble your Adsense income. Give it a go, you'll be amazed by the results.
BASIC ID THEFT DEFENSE: The best proactive defense against basic identity theft is through the placing of an "Initial Fraud Alert" on all three of your credit reports. This "Initial Fraud Alert" accomplishes three important factors: 1.) Your name and personal information can no longer be sold by the credit bureaus to ANY third parties for any marketing purpose (i.e. credit card offers, loan solicitations or credit pre screenings). 2.) No one can be approved for credit with your personal information until the creditor personally calls you at the telephone number you list on your consumer credit report. And, 3.) Requesting this initial fraud alert entitles you to a free copy of all three of your credit reports (one copy from each of the three major credit reporting agencies). Please be advised that this is an "Initial Fraud Alert" which lasts only 90 days. To extend the fraud alert and obtain the above mentioned benefits for 7 years you will need to write to each credit bureau at the address provided within your initial fraud alert confirmation letter (Note: It is likely credit bureaus will make the extended alert harder to obtain as a great deal of their revenue comes from the third party rental and sale your information).
CREDIT HIJACKING DEFENSE: Most online merchants now utilize a security feature known as "Address Verification Service" or "AVS". AVS is a security feature for online merchants allowing them to only authorize credit card transactions for merchandise to be shipped to the same address which appears on the consumers credit card billing statement. If the address does not match that of the credit card billing statement the transaction will automatically be declined. In other words, if someone gets your credit card number, expirations date and CVV code (the three digit code on the back of the card) the only way a transaction can be authorized online is if the merchandise if shipped to the SAME address that your credit card billing statement is currently sent to. This is what makes credit hijacking so dangerous. When a criminal hijacks your credit they call up the banks (posing as you) and change your address on your credit cards with your personal information (i.e. last for of SSN and mothers maiden name) as if you were moving. They then proceed to order thousands of dollars in merchandise (online or over the phone) to be shipped to the "new" address. Because they changed "your address" on your credit cards they will bypass the AVS security from online merchants and the charges will be approved.
The only real defense against credit hijacking is to establish a personal security code with all your bank accounts and credit cards. This is a form of security which goes beyond your SSN, Zip Code, Date of Birth or Mothers Maiden Name to give you a whole new tier of personal security. This is a unique number or group of letters and numbers which you create and give to every credit card provider you have. For example. The number could be as simple as "JACOB2801" which is a combination of your best friend as child and the numerical address of the home you lived in growing up. By establishing this auxiliary passcode with all your credit card providers no one will be granted access to your accounts without it providing it to them. Since you are the only one who knows it and it is non public it is truly secure. I have yet to find a credit card company which will not allow you to create a such a passcode and added layer of security.
Summary
So now with the initial fraud alert established on your credit reports (and later extended) as well as the personal security code set up with all your bank and credit card accounts, you are virtually identity theft proof in under 60 minutes for free. Sure, someone can always "steal" your identity but the real joke will be on them. If they try to open a new credit account anywhere in the country the creditor is going to have to call YOU at the phone number listed on your report in before it can be approved and it's GAME OVER. If they try to hijack your credit by changing the address on your credit accounts they will be asked for not only the last four digits of your SSN and mother maiden name, but also your personal security code which they will NOT know and again it's, GAME OVER.
Please understand that this article deals only with the topic of "financial" identity theft which is by far the most prevalent today. However, you should be aware you also have the following "5 MAJOR" identities in computers across the nation which are your: 1.) Driving Records/History (DMV Databases). 2.) Medical Records/History (Medical Information Bureau Database). 3.) Social Security Records/History (SSA Database). 4.) Insurance Claims/History (C.L.U.E. Database). 5.) Criminal, Legal and Public Record databases from birth records and real estate deeds to corporations, trusts and court cases. Yes, we are in the information age but all information is stored in databases. I think we are now living in the database age.
10 Extra "Financial" Identity Protection Tips
1.) Keep a list of all credit card and bank account numbers with bank phone numbers so in case of loss or theft they can be notified immediately.
2.) Use only one credit card for personal expenses and one card for business expenses and monitor accounts online weekly.
3.) Always send or receive mail only through secure and locked mail boxes.
4.) Never give out any sensitive information (SSN, Acct #, Pin #, Password Etc) via an email solicitation. Always type in and visit the website directly.
5.) Limit the information on your checks to your first initial, last name and address (nothing more).
6.) On all credit cards instead of signing your name write "Check ID!".
7.) Never use a debit card or Visa/Master Check card as recovering fraudulently accessed funds from these accounts can be extremely difficult.
8.) Store all credit cards, bank statements and passports etc in a secure and locked place.
9.) Never give out your Social Security Number, Drivers License Number or Date Of Birth unless they have just cause and really need it.
10.) For details about establishing and initial fraud alert on your credit reports visit: www.experian.com, www.equifax.com, www.transunion.com
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